


August

by MusicalCatharsis



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-26
Updated: 2018-01-31
Packaged: 2019-02-07 01:05:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 17,858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12830028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MusicalCatharsis/pseuds/MusicalCatharsis
Summary: It’s not often that Penelope Garcia finds herself in the field, but for the entire month of August, she has to live with Luke in Tempe, Arizona in order to catch an UnSub. Pretending to be married to the man is easy, but trying not to fall in love with him is proving to be harder than she thought.





	1. Chapter 1

Penelope rolls her bags into the large house, her eyes going wide at the sheer space she was going to be living in for the next few weeks as they tracked down the latest UnSub. Glancing over her shoulder she tosses Luke a shy smile, knowing that she was going to be spending the same amount of time living in this house with him, pretending to be his _wife._ She tries to tell herself that the fluttering in her stomach was just from nerves and not from the attraction she obviously felt for the man. He sighs heavily while placing the box he was carrying onto the kitchen counter and leans forward, sliding his forearms against the smooth surface. Penelope lets her fingers run along the countertop, the cool stone a shock from the sweltering heat of the Arizona sun. The woman was used to wearing rings on her fingers, but never this one as it always meant something more to her. The feeling of the two bands wrapped around her ring finger had caused her to spiral down a dark hole when she slid them on for the first time.

"So this UnSub..." Penelope begins, turning to face Luke in the vast kitchen. The counters were a white granite, a contrast to the light gray beadboard cabinets. She reaches out for the box that Luke had placed on the surface, dragging it slowly to her and opening it. She tries to get into character, watching as the movers...all undercover FBI agents moved about the house. "How long until he will make contact?"

"Within the first two days of the new couple moving in," Luke replies before turning back around. "I'm going to finish unpacking the car, darling." Penelope rolls her eyes at the comment, choosing instead to look down at the rings adorning her fingers with a slight smile. She had put up a fight at being asked to go out into the field in this capacity, asking Emily over and over again why it had to be her and not JJ, or herself, or Tara. Because surely they were all better qualified to take down this UnSub...in the end Emily had stated that it wasn't up for discussion, that the pairing had been well thought out based on the UnSub's type, and she would become Mrs. Luke Reyes until the man who was committing senseless murders was captured.

Penelope acted, yes in the theater, and pretending to fawn over Luke would be easy enough for her to fake. It was the cohabitation that was giving her pause. For all intents and purposes, they were married, and there were pictures to prove it. Her eyes subconsciously glance over to the fireplace in the living room, a picture of her and Luke wrapped around each other at their _wedding_ was proudly displayed in the center. If you stared at the picture long enough you could see past the beaming smiles to the stiff postures, the clenched jaws, the way she didn't completely lean into him the way a woman in love would do. It was the first picture they had taken together _as a couple_ and the rest of the pictures that she had placed around the house weren't much better. Though they were getting there, she thinks to herself as she pulls the latest set out of the box on the counter.

Luke had his arms wrapped around her waist while staring down at her. Penelope's face was tilted up towards him with a wide smile stretched across her lips. The setting sun was shining on them, and Penelope couldn't see any stress between them. Luke had just told her a joke which she found hilarious. If she was being honest with herself, it was her favorite photo and after this case was closed she would be hanging it up in her living room. They were, after all, becoming friends before she was roped into this ridiculous sideshow.

"Pen," she jumps, her eyes refocusing on the picture she held in her hands and blinks quickly before turning her attention to the man. "This is Sean and Deborah Adams, they live across the street," Luke announces, walking back into the house with two boxes in his hands. There's a bead of sweat rolling down his face, Penelope zones in on the flexing of his muscles with a quick blush. Rushing forward she takes the top box from the man and places it on the counter. Forgetting the other people walking behind him, Penelope begins to chastise the man for not being able to see over the top of the boxes. She reaches up to wipe the sweat from his face, giving him a soft smile and then turns to the couple standing behind her husband.

"Hi, it's nice to meet you," she tells them with a wide smile, leaning her head against Luke's shoulder as he slides his hand around her waist. Penelope finds that she doesn't flinch when Luke leans down to press his lips to her forehead, instead, she closes her eyes and lets the feeling of his lips against her skin overtake her.

"Welcome to the neighborhood," Deborah says, extending her hand out to Penelope.


	2. Chapter 2

_August 25, 2018._

_There was pain radiating in places Penelope wasn’t sure was normal, not for her at least. She tries to open her eyes but finds that her lids are too heavy, too laden with sleep to open like she usually would. But she doesn’t remember falling asleep beside Luke last night. She doesn’t remember curling into his side and placing her head on his chest like she had been doing for the past two weeks. Penelope doesn’t remember him pressing his lips to her forehead and wishing her a good night. Penelope finds that she doesn’t even remember how she got to be laying down in the first place, in fact, the last thing she does remember was coming home from the End of Summer Cookout that the Adams’ family had invited them to. If she tries she can remember placing her keys on the hook and tossing her phone onto the coffee table in the living room before calling out for Luke, wanting to finish their discussion from the night before…_

* * *

August 1, 2018.

“I’m a terrible cook,” Penelope mutters while holding up a pan, a look of disgust written clearly on her face. “I burned the scrambled eggs.” Luke looks up from the case file he was reading, his eyes inspecting the scorched eggs before coming to stand next to her. His fingers pry the pan from her hand with a low chuckle, and with his left hand, he begins reaching for spices as he places the pan back on the stove. Penelope hops onto the counter, letting her bare legs swing back and forth as she watches him doctor her cooking with a smile.

“Here,” he says after a few moments, holding out a forkful of scrambled eggs to her mouth. Penelope glances at the black flecks on the egg, trying to discern if she should take a bite before he laughs again. “You burnt them, I just made them edible.” She opens her mouth, keeping her eyes trained on his face as he slowly passes her lips with the fork. She doesn’t pretend that the action isn’t sensual as the spices assault her tongue, causing her to moan loudly. Penelope laughs as he pulls the fork away, her teeth dragging across the metal, and holds her hand to her mouth.

“Okay, so you cook and I clean,” Penelope tells the man with a smile as her phone rings. Hopping down from the counter she races for the device. She slides her finger across the screen and cradles the phone between her right ear and shoulder as she walks back into the kitchen, taking a plate of eggs from Luke and reaching out for the bottle of hot sauce he offered her. She mouths a thank you to the man who shakes his head and returns to his case file. The person on the other end of the line continues speaking as Penelope watches Luke chew on his eggs, and she hopes that there were no shells left from when she cracked them that morning. “Yes, Em, I’m listening.”

Luke lifts his head to look at her, motioning for the woman to put the phone on speaker, to which Penelope shakes her head. She mutes the line and turns to the man, telling him that it’s a woman thing and not a work thing and laughs when his face pulls in confusion before turning back to his case file and breakfast. Penelope takes the call off of mute, humming her disagreement with whatever her friend was saying, before taking a bite of her eggs.

“No, I don’t think you’re being unreasonable,” Penelope tells the woman, letting her eyes slide shut as she takes another bite of the scrambled eggs and glances over at the man who was looking at her and laughing inaudibly. She rolls her eyes and turns back to her food. “Well, Mark knew that becoming the Unit Chief was a full-time job…mhm.” Nodding her head Penelope walks her now empty plate over to the sink and quickly washes the dishes before grabbing a bottle of water from the refrigerator. “I understand that…” she rolls her eyes, and pulls the phone away from her ear and sets it on the counter near the sink. Emily’s voice softly filtering up to her as she rubs her temples. “Emily,” Penelope interrupts the woman’s ranting. “I think you need to tell Mark all of this. He’s the one who can…”

“Prentiss,” Luke says as he comes to put his plate in the sink and placing the call on speaker. “What’s the UnSub’s stressor.” He winks at Penelope, nudging her with his shoulder as he tries to wash the dish. She nudges him back, taking the damp sponge from his hands and washing the dish herself.

“We think his wife left him but that’s as far as we’ve gotten, has anyone else made contact?” Her voice switches from friend to boss in the middle of the sentence and Penelope hangs her head, looking at the sink and thanking the man standing beside her for the pass on the conversation.

“Just the couple across the street. They’re nice people. Deborah is a stay at home mom and Sean is an investment banker. They have two sons and a daughter on the way. We’re having dinner with them tonight, actually.” Penelope interjects, letting her boss know that they weren’t taking an extended vacation, though she could work on her tan in the backyard if she wanted to.

“You’re going to have to meet more people for this to be successful,” Emily mutters, and Penelope and Luke can hear the woman slamming something on her end of the call. “That’s Rossi, we’ve got another case, make sure you check in tonight.”

“Will do,” Luke tells her before reaching out to disconnect the call. He turns to Penelope, and the woman backs away from the sink, dragging her phone with her. “What do you want to do wife?” She rolls her eyes.

“We don’t have to pretend in our own house, Alvez,” she tells him before walking out of the kitchen. “Besides, you have to cook a dessert for dinner tonight.”

“It’s best to stay in character, darling,” he shouts after her. Penelope turns around in the living room, rolls her eyes and shakes her head at the man.

“We can be in character at dinner, I’ll even let you hold my hand.”

* * *

“I met Penelope at a train station in New York,” Luke says, lifting his glass of wine to his lips and tossing his arm around her shoulder. “She had dropped a book as she squeezed past me and I followed her to this little coffee shop in SoHo to return it to her and we ended up discussing the book over cups of coffee that went cold. I was late for work that day, and I remember my boss chewing me out, but it was worth it.” He runs his fingers over the exposed skin of her neck, trailing them softly up to her ear and then back down to her collarbone. Penelope looks over at the man, lifting her own glass to her lips and taking a large gulp. He did this for a living, or at least he had before the BAU, but she was used to computers and nerdy men fumbling with the zippers of her dress in dark rooms. She had never been touched so openly, by fingers that made her feel so charged sexually, and she was sure that it was the alcohol coursing through her veins that made her so brazen.

“And then,” Deborah, who they found like to be called Debbie, leans forward to look at the couple. Her eyes are wide with interest and Penelope lets out a small chuckle and leans into Luke.

“Well, at first I thought he was a creep, but look at that face how could I resist when he asked me out to dinner,” Penelope tells the woman with a bright smile, reaching up with her right hand to pat him on his left cheek. “He picked me up that night and six months later we were getting married. He was transferred to work and now here we are, domesticated and madly in love.”

“That’s so romantic,” Debbie sighs before sitting back in her chair. “I met Sean in high school and we had Lance a few months after we graduated while he was at University.” Penelope tries to listen to the woman’s story because honestly, she is very interested in the tale, but Luke’s hand trailing along the back of her neck and down her left arm was so distracting. He left every inch of skin his fingers came in contact with standing at attention, her flesh pebbling under his touch. The woman tries to control her breathing, hoping that she was not showing the man just how much he was affecting her, but the soft chuckle he emitted lets her know that she failed. “Just look at you two, you can’t keep your hands off of each other! Don’t you miss that Sean?”

“Yes, dear,” he tells her as he leans over to press a kiss to her lips.

“I’m so sorry for my husband’s antics, he’s insatiable it seems,” Penelope stammers before taking another sip of her wine. She lets her eyes flicker to Luke’s face, taking in the smug smile with a fierce determination as she made up her mind. If he wasn’t going to play nice than neither was she, and Penelope knew that she could build sexual tension better than the next person. Yes, this was going to be a fun month. “I should probably get him home, do you need any help cleaning up?” Debbie shakes her head at the couple, letting her lips curl into a wide smile before ushering them out of their seats. Luke shakes hands with Sean, telling the man that they will have to get together this weekend in order to watch the game. When the door closes behind them, Luke places his hand on the small of her back and they slowly walk across the street. He takes his time unlocking the door before turning around to glance back across the street.

“They’re watching us,” he whispers, looking down at her and licking his lips. Penelope shrugs and points to the door. “I’m going to kiss you.”

“Don’t you d-” Penelope’s sentence is cut short by his lips as they press roughly onto hers. The man lifts her off of her feet and turns their bodies, pressing her into the front door and letting out a low growl. His left hand comes up to tangle in her hair, gently pulling her head back as he moves his lips from her mouth, kissing quickly down her neck. Penelope hisses as opens his mouth, letting his tongue trail across her skin before he nips at the overstimulated skin. Luke kisses back up her neck before letting her hair go and wrapping her legs around his waist, his lips coming back to capture hers. His tongue dips into her mouth. Their tongues tangle together and Penelope loses herself in the feeling of his body pressed against hers that she forgets for a moment that this isn’t real.

“Luke,” she mutters as the man begins to pepper her lips with small kisses, trying to get her to stop talking and continue kissing him. “I think that’s enough of a show.” He nods, pulling his lips away from hers and helping the woman back onto her feet. He looks back over his shoulder, raising his hand to wave at the couple still watching them from the window near their front door.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi All! I wanted to take the time to thank you all for reading, following, favoriting, and reviewing! It has meant so much to me, you honestly have no idea. I'm not sure how long this story will be, and I plan on taking us through each day and they won't be all as spread out as these last two chapters. This is just the beginning of the story, and I wanted to set you up with something. Updates will probably happen about once a week, but please don't hold me to that. If you have any questions please reach out or you can message me on Tumblr at itsdawnashlie.

_August 25, 2018._

_She tries to train her eyes on the landmarks around the room, but it's too dark, and she can't feel the familiar weight of her glasses on the bridge of her nose. Penelope tries to figure out exactly how she got here, did she walk into this room on her own, is this room in her own home? She tries to move her hands but finds that they are tied behind her back and her legs are also tied to the chair she is sitting on. She curses lowly, wishing not for the first time this month, that she had the same training as the other agents. The woman is sure that if she had been tactically trained that she would not be here right now, that she would not have been caught off guard in the safety of her own home. Penelope chastises herself for walking blindly into this situation, and if she dies she has nobody to blame but herself. Her bottom lip begins to tremble as tears well in her eyes, and try and she might she can't keep them at bay. Penelope lets out a sob around the gag that had been shoved into her mouth and finds herself thinking of Luke, hoping that he would be on his way to save her._

* * *

 

August 1, 2018.

Penelope listens to the door snap shut behind her and runs her fingers through her hair, trying to compose her feelings long enough to be able to speak to him. But she's lost in the feeling of his hands in her hair, his lips on her neck, and her tongue in her mouth. She's lost in the feeling of him pressed against her body and so Penelope doesn't shake him off when his hands grip her waist in the hallway. She walks backward until she's flush with the wall, the air rushing out of her lungs as they collide with the drywall, rattling the pictures that hang overhead. His lips are on hers again and any semblance of control she had gained over the past few minutes was gone the second she felt his hands on her body again. She feels her knees shake and there's a rush of excitement in her belly, spreading quickly throughout her body. Penelope can feel the electricity in her fingertips as she reaches up to grip the front of her t-shirt, pulling Luke closer to her in the hallway. Her knees buckle as he slides his tongue against her bottom lip, and Penelope feels him wrap his right arm around her waist to steady her.

Luke continues to run his tongue over her bottom lip before she opens her mouth to allow him in. Her hands slide up to run through his hair as their tongues brush slowly against each other. Penelope is silent until the man reaches up with his right hand to cup her left breast and running his thumb over her nipple through the thin material of her dress and bra. She melts, moaning loudly into the man's mouth. Luke stills, his lips stop moving against hers causing Penelope to open her eyes and look at his face, wondering why he had stopped kissing her. She watches as Luke backs away from her slowly while tearing his eyes away from her face.

"I'm sorry," he whispers, before turning to walk away. She wants to tell him that there is nothing to be sorry for, that she liked the feeling of his lips on hers, but she can't find her voice. Penelope turns her head to watch him go, his hands coming up to run through his hair as he rounds the corner into the living room. She sinks to the floor with a whimper, her hand coming up to touch her lips softly. The woman sits there for a long while, her legs going numb from the position she was sitting in as she replays the last hour in her mind. The kisses he had given her and exactly how they had made her feel. She can still feel the arousal settling between her legs, and the woman wonders if he could feel it sliding down her skin when he had slid his thigh between her heated legs. Penelope decided that she would let him kiss her all night long if he wanted to, and the thought scares her because this last hour had done nothing to alleviate the feelings she already had for Luke.

Penelope stands, deciding to go to bed in order to stop the swarming mess of words her brain had turned into, but unsure of where the other occupant of the house was located. She knew that she couldn't trust herself, knew that if she saw him in the hallway that she would throw herself into his arms and plant her lips against his again. But that wasn't good for their case. She supposes that it was good for making the people in this neighborhood believe that they were madly in love with each other, but continuing to kiss him like that, well she knew it wasn't good for her heart. She walks quickly through the living room, passing the bathroom and hearing the shower running, before closing herself into the bedroom.

Once she slides into the bed, feeling the cool breeze from the central air conditioning unit slide across her body, Penelope finds herself hoping that he would enter the room, but he never does. It's not a mystery to her as to why she was so disappointed when she eventually fell asleep, but the dog that jumps onto the bed with her is a welcome addition to the cool sheets.

* * *

 

August 2, 2018.

When she awakes the next morning she can smell pancakes. Stretching her legs out, Penelope lets her toes slide across the cold sheets and sighs. She had wanted to be able to forget everything from the night before, but the second she opens her eyes the feeling of his hands on her body assault her. She pads down the hallway, noticing that Roxy was missing from the bed and she panics for a second, knowing that he had come into the room while she was sleeping in order to take the dog for a walk. Penelope grabs her laptop. Insistent that they were going to go back to being professional after last night, she couldn't let her feelings get in the way of catching the UnSub.

"I think we should go and meet a few people today." Penelope stops when she enters the kitchen, her breath catching in her throat at the sight of him standing at the stove with a spatula in his hands. She can clearly see the rippled muscles in his back as he flips another pancake. Groaning, Penelope walks closer to the kitchen counter, her bare feet shuffling silently as she approaches him.

"Okay," he replies over his shoulder, flashing her a wide grin. The woman's heart stops as his teeth are bared, her eyes sliding shut as her heartbeat picks up in rhythm. She's not sure what else she was going to say to the man as he turns around to slide a plate of food in front of her. Glancing down she notes that he had garnished the pancakes with fresh fruit. And she's sure in that moment, if she didn't have a spark of attraction for the man before, she would have one now. Penelope finds herself staring at his chest and the well-defined muscles that litter his stomach and lets out a very audible whine. Shaking her head she slides into the chair at the counter and pulls the food closer to her, ignoring the chuckle the man had given her as she opens her laptop with the other hand.

"Can you please put a shirt on," she snaps at the man. Her fingers begin tapping on the keyboard, running a search on their neighbors in order to compile a list of the people who they should make contact with first.

"Is it distracting?" he asks, coming around the kitchen counter in order to eat his breakfast. He nudges her with his elbow, sliding his smooth skin against hers.

"No," she mutters darkly, rolling her eyes and taking a bite of her food before letting her eyes settle onto his frame again. "It's just...rude, I'm not walking around her shirtless."

"You could, I wouldn't mind," he whispers, before shoveling a bite of food into his mouth and chewing with his mouth closed. Her computer dings and she grips it quickly, dragging it across the counter and turning it for both of them to look at.

"Anyway," Penelope mutters, glaring at the man. "I think we should introduce ourselves to these three people. This couple here, the Brown's are going through a very public and very nasty divorce, the Foley's are separated and both have recently started dating, and Samuel Martin's wife moved out. Leaving him with two teenaged boys, aged thirteen and fifteen. From her records, Mary Martin is living with her new boyfriend a few towns away."

"Sounds good," Luke tells her, reaching around her laptop in order to slide her plate of pancakes in front of her again. "But I'm going to need you to eat before I drag you out into this heat today, wife." He slides out of the chair and rinses his plate in the sink before leaving the room. Penelope turns her head to watch him leave, her eyes roving over his perfectly sculpted body, and she wonders how in the world she is going to make it through the next month without dragging him into bed with her and losing herself in how he could make her feel.

 


	4. Chapter 4

_August 25, 2018_

_Footsteps. Back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. She counts ten paces each way and follows the heavy stomping with her eyes. It's then that she realizes that she's in a basement. She must still be within the neighborhood, or at least she hopes that she is. When the footsteps stop, she hangs her head forward, letting her eyes fall back onto her lap and tries to stem the flow of tears that have been streaming down her face. The woman had stopped sobbing when she heard the footsteps, not wanting to call more attention to herself. Penelope tries to remember the things her team had taught her over the years, was she supposed to resist or was she supposed to give this person what they wanted? Was she supposed to cry and beg for her life or was she supposed to stay silent? It's all a blank to her right now as her heart beats steadily in her chest, her lungs continue to to function properly, and her mind is still clear. She tries to formulate a plan as the room grows darker around her as the sun fades. She tries to figure out how she is going to handle this situation when the door opens. A light illuminates a wooden staircase and Penelope watches intently as a single pair of legs descends the stairs. "Say hello to your husband, Penny,"...the person says while roughly gripping her chin._

* * *

August 2, 2018

"You're not going to make it through the day with that sweater," Luke tells her as he looks up from the case file he was currently reading. Penelope looks down at her outfit, taking in the soft pleats of the skirt of her dress and sighs. She had to admit that he was right, but the outfit doesn't ever feel complete without the cardigan. The woman was already upset that she wasn't able to wear the matching blue tights and wonders, not for the first time, if she could spend the rest of the month inside the confines of the home. She looks up when he speaks again. "You look nice by the way."

"Thanks," Penelope replies as she peels the cardigan from her arms and tosses it over the arm of their couch with a lingering look for an outfit ruined. "Who are we going to meet?"

"You made the list," he mumbles without taking his eyes off of the case file. She watches as his lips curl up into a soft smile as he antagonizes her. "I figured we'd take Roxy for a quick walk before it gets too hot. Then we're going to need to go to the grocery store because if I'm going to be doing the cooking, I'm going to need more than what you already picked up." He looks up at her finally as he closes the case file. "Then we come back hom...here and continue to go over the evidence from the previous homicides. I don't want to call too much attention to ourselves." Penelope nods her head as she leans down to buckle the strap on her wedges with a sigh.

"I should have just packed flip flops if you're going to ruin all of my outfits," she tells the man crossly as he chuckles.

"It's already eighty degrees and it's not even nine in the morning," Luke replies as he stows the case file underneath the couch. "Wear the cardigan if you want but I don't want to hear you complaining about the heat." The woman rolls her eyes as she stands and makes her way to the door.

"Let's just get this walk over with," Penelope grumbles while crossing her arms over her chest. Luke reaches down to clip a leash onto Roxy's collar before stepping out of the house and extending his hand to the woman. He waits as she rolls her eyes before wrapping her hand around his. The sudden wave of heat rushes across Penelope's skin and causes the woman to stumble. She realizes that he's used to this, having spent a lot of time heavily suited under temperatures that reached higher than these levels. The most Penelope was used to now was a humidity that caused her to pile her hair on top of her head.

"We're only going to make it to the end of the block," Luke tells her softly. "I don't want to burn her paws." Penelope looks up at him with a smile, her eyes scanning from the cover of her sunglasses as Roxy trots happily on the lawns in front of them. She doesn't notice anything out of the ordinary, not until he points them out to her. The man mowing his lawn looked at them a bit too long, a curtain moved as they walked past a neighbor's house, and suddenly a garage door slammed shut. All things that she would have overlooked as a coincidence had she just happened to be strolling along on her own. She realizes now that everything was a potential clue as they waited for the UnSub to strike again and feels a chill roll down her spine. She didn't think that it was possible for her to feel cold in this unbearable heat, but she couldn't shake the feeling of someone's eyes on her as she walks with Luke, and Penelope finds herself clutching onto his hand tighter than before.

When they reach the end of the street, Luke turns and asks her to move to his left side which causes Penelope to look up at him with a questioning gaze.

"It's polite for the guy to walk on the outside and closest to the street," he smiles and leans down to press a kiss to the tip of her nose. Penelope scrunches up her face, half in disgust, the other half in a manner that she finds is too cute to call attention to as a fluttering erupts in her stomach. And before she can stop it, the woman has recalled the feelings from the night before. Shaking her head, Penelope concentrates on the steps they need to take in order to get back to the house, and when they do arrive there is a man standing on the doorstep with a basket.

"Good morning," Luke calls out as he lets go of her hand and walks quickly up the driveway with Roxy. Penelope lifts the sunglasses off of her face and slides them into her hair as she watches his body move so smoothly. She can't help herself as she stares at the muscles in his legs peeking out from underneath a pair of beige cargo shorts. He turns when he gets to the steps, beckoning her forward which causes her face to flush in embarrassment at having been caught staring at the man. "This is my lovely wife, Penelope." Luke introduces her when she finally makes it up the steps and under the cover of the porch. She's grateful for the reprieve that the missing sunlight has given her as Luke reaches to open the front door. "Pen, this is Mr. Martin."

"Sam," the man corrects as he sticks out his hand in order to shake Penelope's. "I wanted to get over here and introduce myself yesterday but you were on your way to Sean and Debbie's so I figured it was best to leave you to it." Penelope nods with a wide smile as she watches Roxy bound off into the house.

"It's a pleasure to meet you," she tells the man as Luke wraps his arm around her shoulder and drops a kiss to her temple. "We were just about to have some lemonade, do you want to join us?" Penelope isn't entirely sure what she should be doing during this undercover operation, but she figures that inviting as many people into their home as possible was the best way to go about getting close to those they were investigating.

Sam shakes his head, "no thank you, I've got to get Travis and David to their practices, but it was nice meeting you both. Maybe some other time?" Luke nods while pulling his arm off of her shoulder. He shakes hands with the man as Penelope walks into the house, making sure to check that Roxy's bowl was full of chilled water before Luke entered the home.

"Did you see the way he flinched?" Penelope shakes her head as she pops up from her crouching position. She watches as he passes by her in the kitchen in order to grab a bottle of water from the fridge. He holds one up to her in question, to which she nods and catches the bottle he tosses across the room to her. "When I kissed your forehead. He flinched like I went to hit him."

"I'll make a note of it," she replies, thinking back again to the feeling of his lips on hers. His hands brushing across the vast expanses of skin that he could come into contact with the previous night. She can't help herself as she opens her mouth, "why did you stop?" Luke pauses in the kitchen, his shoulders stiffening with the bottle of water to his mouth. She needed to know, the question had been gnawing at her all evening and then again this morning. Was it because this was just pretend to him, was she not good enough, did he not want her the same way that she wanted him?

"It's complicated," he mutters and Penelope rolls her eyes as she moves to stand in front of him.

"Un-complicate it then," she tells him. Her words are harsh even to her own ears and she flinches from them as his eyes snap to hers. "Is it because I'm not pretty enough for you? Because you seemed very into things last night and it's not like I wasn't a consenting party, I was basically melting against the wall and it had nothing to do with the heat. I wanted whatever was going to happen between us, but you stopped, and I need to know why."

"I don't want any regrets, Penelope," he responds after a few moments of silence. "Right now tensions are high and emotions are raw and we're closer than we have ever been. One of the first things they tell us is that whatever happens when you're undercover isn't real and when this is over, I'll still be Luke and you'll still be Penelope and we will still have to look at each other." Luke takes a deep breath and finally makes eye contact with her. "I was out of line to kiss you again once we got back in the house, and I apologize." He moves to walk away from her, reaching down to rub the top of Roxy's head with a soft smile.

"Hey," Penelope calls out in a soft voice and waits until the man turns around to look at her. "I'm still Penelope right now and you're still Luke. It's not like one of us is in the dark here," She lifts her right hand and drops it quickly to her side as she speaks. "I'm not sure what will happen tomorrow, a week from now, or next month, but I know how I felt when you kissed me and I know how I felt before all of this too."

"How about we go over the evidence," Luke says. "And we can talk more about whatever" he points back and forth between the two of them. "this is after we get some work done." Penelope stands and continues to watch him as he pulls out the case files and her laptop from under the couch with a small smile on her face. She settles herself onto the couch after pulling her shoes off and wiggles her fingers over her keyboard, ready to work.

"Okay," she begins softly. "Tell me again what happens to the women after the UnSub kidnaps them?" Deep in the recesses of her mind, Penelope wanted to be prepared for the possibility that the next woman in this person's grasp could be her. Luke sighs.

"From what the local authorities could gather he contains them for a week before killing them," he tells her. "But that's not going to be you." Penelope lets out a nervous laugh as she glances at him.

"No, because I have you to protect me," she whispers, leaning over to bump her shoulder against his on the couch. "Anyway."

"Right, so the guy is attacking interracial couples and going after the wives specifically. We think it's to punish his own wife, but it's also torture on the spouse." Luke let's the thought linger between them as she pulls up the pictures of the previous crime scene and shudders. "See the ligature marks here," Luke points to the woman's wrist. "And here on her ankles. So we know that he's keeping them tied down, but we're not sure to what."

"I mean being tied up is fun and all," Penelope mutters under her breath. Her face immediately turns a shade of red she's not very familiar with. "I mean, well...a chair maybe?" Luke laughs as he turns to look at her.

"Reid and Matt think she may be tied to a bed, but I'm not so sure," Luke mutters as he stares at the pictures.

"What if she's tied to a chair," Penelope asks as she types out the observation of Sam flinching when Luke kissed her on the temple. "I mean that would work too right?"

Nodding, Luke responds, "Yeah, that would work too." Penelope looks over at Luke as he runs his hands down his face and sighs in frustration. "I just feel like I'm missing a piece of this puzzle."

"We should call Emily and check in," Penelope says in order to distract the man while pulling out her cell phone and dialing the number. "Hey Em, you're on speaker."

"Hey guys, any updates?" Penelope looks over to Luke and motions for him to begin the conversation.

"We met a Sam Martin today, his wife recently left him with two teenaged boys Travis and David and he flinched when I showed physical affection to Garcia," Luke informs their boss as he glances at Penelope.

"And how did dinner with the other couple go?" Penelope stills and looks over at Luke and shakes her head.

"Fine," they both answer. "They seem like nice people and happily married, I don't think they have anything to do with this, but it's too early to tell." Luke finishes with a sigh. "How are things going at the precinct?"

"They're moving slowly, JJ and Matt have gone home to spend time with their kids but they'll be back in a few days. I want to see you both on Sunday for your weekly check-in." Emily tells them, sighing heavily.

"When and where?" Luke asks, pulling a piece of paper to him and plucking a pen from Penelope's grasp.

"Noon," Emily tells him. "At the mall. That way it can look like we're shopping."

"Or we could actually go shopping," Penelope finally says with a wide smile. "Because this house could totally use a splash of color."


	5. Chapter 5

_August 25, 2018._

_Her eyes are wide as she stares at the person before her. The fingers gripping her chin are too rough, pressing her cheeks against her teeth so harshly that she wants to cry out in pain. Her head has been jerked backward, the force of the gripping causing her to hit the wooden chair. Penelope can't formulate a single word as the bright light of a cell phone is shoved in her face. There are so many things that she wants to say to Luke right now. She could tell him that she loves him. She could tell him that she would always be his. She could tell him that this past month had been the best in her life. Penelope wants to say something to Luke, wants to beg him to leave her, to save himself. It's too late for her already, she knows this as they've studied this case backward and forward since the middle of last month. She doesn't utter a sound when the back of the person's hand connects loudly with her chin. Penelope relaxes instead of tenses as the hand slaps her for a second time. "Listen to me when I speak to you, Penny, and I just may let you live." It's laughable because this was the end of the line for her. She had made it as far as she was going to. Closing her eyes she thinks of Luke and waits for whatever comes next._

* * *

August 2, 2018.

"Get your shoes on," Luke tells her suddenly as he shuts the case file he had been reading. Penelope jumps as the sound of his voice cuts through the silence. He leans back into the couch and rubs at his eyes tiredly. Stubbornly she tucks her feet under her and leans back on the couch as well. "This isn't making sense."

"A lot of things don't make sense," Penelope mutters as she slides her eyes closed and leans her back against the soft cushions of the couch. "I don't know how you guys do this all the time, it's exhausting looking for clues that don't exist." Luke sighs and turns his head against the couch to look at Penelope with a wry smile and shrugs.

"Let's go grocery shopping," he tells her. "Because you may be able to live off of nuts and vegetables but Roxy and I need meat." Penelope rolls her eyes at the man but blushes at the thoughts that run through her mind. Averting her gaze she bends down to pull on her shoes.

"Can we talk while we shop," her voice is smaller than she ever remembers it being as she slides her hands up her legs. She wraps her arms around her stomach and looks over at Roxy with a soft smile. The tension in the room is palpable as she finishes her question, and Penelope finds herself wishing that she could take the question back. She finally gathers enough courage to look at the man, he's staring at her so softly that she is sure her heart is going to melt from the gaze. "We've been dancing around each other for months, and I tried to tell Emily that I didn't want to do this with you because it would be awkward for the both of us but she didn't listen. And I know that you regret our kiss from a few months ago, and I know that we were both drunk but I don't regret it. Luke, I don't regret a single thing, and I know that I'm not your-"

"Stop," Luke cuts her off sharply as he holds up his hand and shakes his head. "Just stop right there, Garcia." He sighs loudly before turning his body to face her. "I never once said that I regret our kiss because I don't. I don't regret kissing you the first time at O'Keefe's, I don't regret kissing you up against your apartment door when I brought you home, and I don't regret the last several times I've kissed you. I want to spend hours kissing you, Penelope." Luke stands up from the couch in order to let Roxy outside to use the bathroom. Penelope watches him pick up after her through the living room window, his eyes darting back and forth between Roxy and the house. The woman hated the way he could always just leave a conversation. He couldn't say things like he just did and then just get up and walk away. She was still staring out of the window when they both reenter the house, Luke wiping the beads of sweat from his forehead. "And I never want to hear you say that you're not my anything, because you have no idea what you are to me, Garcia. Now please, let's go to the store because I can't survive off of pancakes."

Penelope nods while letting her eyes follow the man towards the front door. He darts his hand out to grab the car keys from the hook near the door and opens the handle before turning back to find her still sitting on the couch. He looks at her and laughs loudly which causes the woman to spring off of the couch and race to the front door. Her mind is racing a mile a minute, trying to decipher exactly what it is that the man had just said to her. Penelope follows Luke to the vehicle and smiles at him when he opens the passenger door for her.

"Why didn't you say anything after," Penelope says once they get into the car. "I spent weeks trying to talk to you about that kiss and my feelings and you ignored me." She's angry. For the first time since it happened, she's able to finally talk about it and she finds that she wants to yell at the man pulling out of the driveway. But she plasters on a wide smile and looks at him in case the neighbors were watching. She was already hating this month and it was only the second day. She continues softly, "I thought something was wrong with me, Luke." He glances over at her quickly as he guides the car through the familiar streets.

"I'm sorry," he mutters after a while. She watches his fingers tap against the steering wheel. "I'm not good at this, Garcia. The longest and most stable relationship I've ever had is with Roxy, you don't want to take up with me."

"Don't tell me what I want, Luke," Penelope hisses as he pulls the car to a stop in the parking lot. She looks over at him harshly, her eyes roam his face and she notices the tension in his jaw. She proceeds softer than before, "because you don't know what I want. I don't know if you think that you're damaged, or ruined, but you're not. So let's get over the whole woe is me thing," she climbs out of the car and walks over to his door. "And let's do it quickly."

* * *

 

"Nutella is everything," Penelope mutters as she dips another cookie into the open jar while they lounge on the couch later that night. The television is on in the background. She lets out a soft moan and darts her tongue out to lick a bit of the spread off of her bottom lip. She swats gently at Luke's hand as he reaches over to dip his own cookie into the jar.

"It is," he agrees with her. "Now share before I steal the entire thing and hide it someplace you can't reach, shorty." Penelope glares over her glasses at him, kicking out with her feet and catching him on the side. Luke hisses and moves further away from her. "Your feet are freezing," he shouts out. "Why are they so cold?"

Shrugging, Penelope responds, "my feet are always cold, you might want to get used to it." Luke reaches out to grip at her ankle and tugs her body towards him on the couch.

"I'm extremely damaged, Penelope," he tells her as he settles her legs over his lap gently. Penelope stares up at him, her hands still clutching the jar of Nutella. Luke pries the jar from her hands and places it on the coffee table along with the case file he had been re-reading. "I have nightmares frequently. I'm headstrong, and needy, clingy, demanding, hot-tempered, and I'm extremely jealous. I don't want a slow romance where I have to wine and dine you, though I will do that if it's what you want, I'll probably do it anyway. But if you truly want to be with me, the real me, not this husband we have created then you have to realize that I'm all in..." He looks down at her and Penelope can see the intensity in his eyes, the raw truth behind his words, and her heart begins to beat quicker in her chest. She finds herself nodding quickly, her mouth hanging open and the taste of Nutella still on the tip of her tongue. "We'll most likely fight, over almost everything, but if this is what you truly want then I'm willing to try because I'm crazy for you."

"It's what I want," Penelope whispers after a few moments. "But is it what you want?"

Luke sighs, "I tried to not want a relationship with you," he tells her honestly. "But you got under my skin and then Emily threw us together. And now here we are." He leans over her on the couch and smiles down at her softly. She watches as his hair flops forward onto his forehead.

"Here we are," she whispers back to him while nodding. "You're not damaged." Penelope reaches up to push his hair off of his forehead and lets her fingers trail down his cheek softly. His eyes close as he leans his cheek against her palm. She rubs her thumb over his cheek, feeling the stubble underneath her fingertip and smiles again before pulling his face down to hers. She kisses him tenderly, her lips brushing against his so lightly that she's not even sure that she's applying pressure. Her heart is fluttering so quickly in her chest, having finally made it to a place in their relationship where they could discuss what had happened months ago.

"I hope you know what you're getting yourself into," Luke whispers against her lips before kissing her harder. His hands cup her face, pulling her up into a sitting position, one hand sliding around her waist to hold her to his chest. Penelope wraps her arms around his neck and slides herself further onto his lap on the couch. She lets out a small moan as his left-hand tangles in her hair, her mind slipping back to his words.

"Jealousy," she mutters against his lips. Luke groans, his arms stiffening around her. Penelope reaches behind her for the case file and pulls it between them as she gnaws on her bottom lip, flipping it open. She points at the pictures of the women and wild look in her eyes. "Luke, if we're assuming that our UnSub is heterosexual then why isn't he killing the men? Stay with me here, what if the UnSub is actually a female who is jealous of the wife?"

"...that makes more sense," Luke mutters while looking down at the file. "And that could be why the UnSub has to restrain the victims, she could be smaller than the victims and not very intimidating." Penelope reaches behind her again in order to grab her phone and dials a familiar number, she places the call on speaker and holds it between the both of them.

"Garcia," Emily mutters into the phone. "It's two in the morning, was another victim taken?"

"No," Luke says. "We think the UnSub is a female, it could be what we've been missing. Garcia and I are going to go over the case files again in the morning but we wanted to update you."

"Thanks," Emily yawns. "I'll call you in the morning." Luke disconnects the call and pulls the phone from Penelope's hands. She watches as he lets the device slide to the floor before grasping her face between his hands.

"I'm going to go back to kissing you now," Luke tells her softly. "And you're not going to think about anything except for what's happening right here between us, understood?" Penelope nods and closes her eyes and loses herself in the feeling of his lips against hers.

 

 

 


	6. Chapter 6

_August 25, 2018_

_Penelope laughs...the situation suddenly becoming hilarious to her as the person slaps her again. She had survived worse things, had survived being shot, had survived the heartbreak of Derek leaving her and the team, had survived this last month with the most infuriating man she had ever come across. "What's your name," Penelope asks through her laughter. "If you're going to kill me, I think I should at least get to know your name." It was a reasonable request, a last ditch attempt to humanize the person currently holding her captive. The person glares down at her before they resume filming her. "You don't need to know my name, Penelope. I want you to tell your husband how much you love him. How much your relationship means to you." Penelope nods and closes her eyes, the blinding light causing her headache to worsen. "Hi Luke," Penelope whispers softly. "I just wanted to tell you that I'm okay," she chuckles darkly. "I seem to have found myself in a little predicament but I don't want you to worry about me, okay? These last few weeks have been amazing and I want to tell you that I don't regret this past week in the slightest, okay. I don't regret a single thing about our time together, not how we began, not the middle, and definitely not the end. I love you, baby..."_

* * *

 

August 5, 2018

Luke wraps his arm around the back of her chair as she sips an iced tea from the local Starbucks chain while they wait for Emily to arrive. His fingers are tracing circles on her upper arm and before she knows it, Penelope turns her face towards him and rests her forehead against his lips, silently asking the man for a kiss. He laughs before appeasing her request, the man presses two extra kisses to her forehead for good measure before smiling down at her. He flicks her drink with his index finger before muttering, "drink your tea, babe."

It was easy for them to fall into this natural rhythm, not just because they had been thrown together so haphazardly, but because they had finally had that clarifying conversation. Penelope remembers how raw she had felt after baring her emotions to the man before silently praying for him to return her feelings. She took a chance and hoped that he had the same feelings that she did. The woman realizes now how ridiculous her sudden move was, because what if he didn't feel the same way. They were already into the operation, they couldn't just pull her out and replace her with another Agent, no...they would have been stuck together for the remainder of the month with her feelings hanging over them like a dangling knife. She wouldn't have been able to relax around the man and she would have been anxious to get away from him at every turn.

"Don't you two look cozy." Penelope beams brighter than she had in days at her boss and one of her best friends as Emily slides into the chair beside her. She smiles even wider when she sees Spencer sit down at the table as well.

"Marriage looks good on you," Spencer whispers to Penelope with a wink. She rolls her eyes as Luke scans the immediate area, looking for people who may be listening in on their conversation.

"We think it's a jilted lover," Luke finally tells his boss. "So I don't think we're looking for someone who is actively in a relationship." He leans forward and folds his hands on the tabletop before looking at Penelope with a smile. "We should probably be looking for a woman. One who entered into a relationship with a married man, either while he was going through a rough patch or while things were still fine at home." Penelope nods and leans forward to place her hand over his on the table and smiles when he turns his palm over to lace their fingers together. She looks up at waves at someone she recognized from their neighborhood before turning back to the people sitting across the table from her.

"Eventually, the husband went back to the wife and broke things off with the woman," she finishes his thought process. They had stayed up late the night before, pouring over the case files with pots of coffee before piecing everything together.

"Okay, this is good information," Emily tells them with a smile. "And I assume you've dug into their backgrounds Garcia?" Penelope nods before reaching into her purse and pulling out a neatly wrapped gift.

"Happy Birthday, Em," she tells the woman as the person she recognized moved closer to their table.

"I think we have ears," Luke mutters while standing up and grabbing Penelope's tea for her. He pushes her chair in before wrapping his arm around her waist and guiding them away from the table. Looking over her shoulder, Penelope makes sure that Emily and Spencer are following them out of the food court. They duck into the nearest store, making sure to weave their way away from the throngs of people milling about the main aisles and soon find themselves mixed in with the home décor. Her eyes light up as she begins looking at the objects on the shelves. When Emily and Spencer catch up to the pair of them, Luke continues talking. "The information is in the present."

Spencer nods, "Is everything else going okay though, you guys are settled in?" He watches as Penelope reaches out for a large vase painted in varying shades of blue and laughs as Luke reaches out to grab the object from her hands.

"We can get a cart later," he tells her while laughing.

Penelope glares at him before stating, "oh, we don't need a cart darling, I won't be picking up that much."

"I'm not falling for that again," he replies. "We'll get a cart."

"It's creepy," Emily mutters to Spencer who nods. "They're actually getting along better than they do at the office."

"Damn it, Penelope," Luke hisses. "I can only carry so much, would you please go get a damn cart!" Emily laughs as they continue bickering.

"Okay guys, we're going to leave you to your shopping," she announces their departure while holding up her wrapped case file. "Call me later." Penelope nods and waves her hand in the direction of her boss before adding another item to the growing pile of things in Luke's arms.

* * *

 

"We should throw a party," Penelope announces as she comes out of the bathroom rubbing lotion into her hands later that night. Luke looks up at her from the floor where he is petting Roxy with wide eyes. "You know, a housewarming get to know you kind of party. Meeting these neighbors one by one isn't going so well and I really miss my house and weather that doesn't melt my face off every day." Luke laughs before kissing Roxy on the top of her head and making his way to the bathroom. He leaves the door open slightly and Penelope can see him peel his shirt off before he turns the knob for the shower. She tries to tear her eyes away from the man, knowing that she should give him privacy but she wants nothing more than to stare at him.

"I guess," he shouts out to her and causes her to jump and avert her gaze. She's blushing a deep shade of red when he pokes his head out of the bathroom door and asks her to hand him the pile of clothes on top of the dresser. Penelope walks closer to hand him the clothes and squeals when his right-hand wraps around her wrist and pulls her into the bathroom with him. He uses his left hand to slam the bathroom door shut before placing a kiss on the side of her neck. "If we must leave this state, and this house, and this bathroom, then I guess we should catch the UnSub before we do, and we can't catch her from this bedroom."

Penelope lets out a sigh as his hands move to grip her waist and push her back against the door. His lips continue kissing down her neck sloppily, hungrily, without any thought or pattern and she finds herself getting lost in the sensation. She's not even entirely sure what she asked him to do until he pulls away from her taking the fog he presents with him. She watches with a heaving chest as he hooks his hands into the waistband of his pants and begins to pull them lower as he backs up towards the shower with a smirk.

"Are you joining me," he taunts her. Penelope knows that he knows she would join him any day. Her body literally craved his touch. She already wasn't sure what she was going to do when they got home. Already they were used to each other, him cooking each meal and her cleaning it up. Him waking up early and her sleeping in. Him rocking his hips against hers as she cries out when he takes her through peaks and valleys that she wasn't ever sure she would be able to achieve. They didn't mean to travel down this path a few nights ago, in fact, Penelope had planned to keep it very innocent. A few light kisses that would leave both of their heads spinning when they pulled back. Maybe some light groping over clothes that would leave them breathless and panting for more. What she didn't expect was the fire that erupted in her body when he touched her, the passion that consumed her brain as he dragged his lips across her skin, the desire that fell from her lips as he dragged his teeth across her collarbone.

She didn't mean to beg him to take her, but the second the words had spilled from her mouth the man had been insatiable. Penelope had never been more satisfied in her life, but she had also never wanted to lie with someone so frequently in her life either. She licks her lips now, watching as his pants drop to his ankles as he steps out of the clothes and under the spray of the shower. She watches as the steam consumes his frame, and his hair slicks down to his head when matted down by water. She gulps audibly as the droplets bounce off of his taut muscles and feels a familiar clench between her legs as she grips the hem of her shirt and lifts it over her head.

There was time for thinking about consequences later when they returned home, but for right now Penelope just wanted to live. She lets out a breathy moan when she enters the shower and closes the sliding door behind her and squeaks when her body is immediately pressed into the wall. The cool tiles causing her nipples to harden as his hands roam her body freely. She lets go, dulling out the screaming voice inside her head with thoughts of what this man could do to her body. And when he kisses her shoulder blade, dragging his stubble across her skin, Penelope reaches up to run her fingers through the slick strands of his hair.

He enters her quickly underneath the stream of water as her eyes close, her hips rocking back against him as Luke reaches around to grip each of her breasts in a different hand. He places sloppy kisses along her shoulder alternating between that and telling her how beautiful he thinks she is. She doesn't even care that her hair is matted to her forehead or the fact that she had yet to wipe off her makeup for the day and it was probably rolling down her face, or the fact that her moans were so loud she was sure the neighbors could hear them.

And later, when they're dried off and laying between the soft sheets together, he tells her of his childhood and she tells him of hers. Each regaling the other with tales of laughter, love, and eventual heartbreak. She wonders if they would have ever gotten this close had it not been for this assignment.

"Luke," she whispers softly as her fingers dance across the skin of his stomach. Penelope peers up at him, noticing that his eyes are closed as he hums to her that he is listening. "What are we going to do after we catch this UnSub? About us, I mean?"

Opening his eyes, Luke looks down at her with a tired grin, "Honestly, I planned on moving myself and Roxy into your apartment and never letting you out of my sight," he tells her. "I warned you that I was needy and clingy." Penelope nods and pulls her lip between her teeth, trying to contain her smile. "Is that okay," he asks suddenly sounding unsure of himself.

"It's fine," she yawns. "Going to have to get a bigger place though, my closet has no space for your things."


	7. Chapter 7

_August 25, 2018_

" _Why?" Penelope asks after the bright light disappeared. "What did any of these women do to you?" The other woman begins pacing before her, ten steps forward, ten steps backward. They're both silent for a while, neither of them saying a word as the question hangs between them. Penelope knew that she should probably keep her mouth shut, knew deep down that she shouldn't anger the person holding her captive, but her incessant thirst for knowledge led her to ask the question anyway. "They're happy," the woman says softly. "Their husbands use people like me for a bit of fun, tossing their money at me, and making me feel as if I am the only person in the world. I fell in love with him, you know, I honestly did. He told me that he was going to divorce her and marry me. He promised." She stops and turns to glare at Penelope. "But he went back to her like a lovesick puppy. And then you show up with your husband who looks at you as if you're the only person in the world and I tried to get Luke to pay attention to me. I tried so hard but he didn't even look at me, and when he did finally look at me it was as if I was dirt on the bottom of his shoe. What's so much better about you," she spits at Penelope with disgust. "What makes you and her and the rest of them so special?"_

* * *

 

August 10, 2018

She lets her eyes scan the room from under her bangs and takes her time inspecting each person as they walk around her home. The small community had jumped at the opportunity over the past week to get to know the two of them. She had always thought close knit communities like this existed in the pages of her romance novels, or on the silver screen, but never in real life. She didn't expect to be dropped down into a modern day version of the Stepford Wives, but here she was, waltzing around her _house_ with an apron tied around her waist. She'd be lying if she said that she didn't enjoy at least a part of it.

Penelope looks over at Luke and smiles at the man while he drinks a beer with Sean, Sam, and someone she had yet to be introduced to. Her heart is pumping faster than she could have ever imagined when she pulls up a memory of a few minutes before the doorbell had rung to announce the first guest, where Luke had bent her over the back of the couch and slid his hands between her legs. The woman had thought for sure that she had bit a hole into the couch cushions from the sheer force of her teeth sinking into the material. When he had finished and removed his hand from between her folds she stood on wobbling legs and moved an afghan to cover the wet spot she had left behind.

"Penelope, these spring rolls are amazing," Debbie announces as she walks closer to the blonde woman, pulling her from her memories. "Where did you get them?"

"I make them," she replies before looking up at the sound of the doorbell ringing again. She wasn't equipped to watch an entire room full of people, she didn't have the same eye as the rest of the team and while she is thankful _now_ that her boss had chosen her to go on this expedition, she will never understand why a more trained agent wasn't here with Luke. "Who is that?" Penelope points to the woman who had just walked into the room. Her hair was long and dark, almost black and was held back from her face with a pair of sunglasses.

"That's Stephanie," Debbie spits the name out in disgust as she tears her eyes away from the woman who was currently flipping her hair behind her back. Penelope did have to admit that the woman was beautiful with her long tanned legs that were barely covered by a pair of shorts. Her midsection was bared for the entire party to see as she wore a very thin, and she suspected, see through cropped tank top that barely covered her breasts. "Her husband used to own the local gas stations until he passed away about a year ago. From what I can tell she's been making it her life's mission to sleep with every male in the neighborhood." Debbie nodded her head over in the direction of the woman who was laughing and trailing her hand down Sam's arm as she laughed at something one of the other men said. "I'd better go..."

Penelope watches the woman walk quickly over to her husband and slip her hand through his. She didn't have to be a trained agent to see the tension between the seemingly normal couple, and Penelope made a mental note to run another check on them once the party died down. She smiles widely as Luke looks up at her and beckons her over with two fingers, the same fingers from earlier, as he holds a beer. It's natural, almost like breathing, as she approaches him and feels his arm slip around her waist. He plants his lips to her temple before turning to introduce her to the rest of the people he was conversing with.

"Pen, this is Mike and I'm sorry, your name was again?" Penelope would have laughed at the expression on the woman's face had it not been for the glare she was currently tossing in Debbie's direction.

"Stephanie, but you can call me Steph," she says loudly before schooling her features and turning to look at Penelope and Luke. There's a strong feeling in the pit of her stomach as she watches the woman glare darkly at her neighbor and Penelope can't stop herself from shivering in Luke's grasp. "Oh, aren't you two just adorable." The blonde woman had to agree but she turns back to Luke with a wide smile and lays her hand on his chest, letting the rings on her fingers catch the sunlight beaming in through the windows.

"I like to think so," she gushes to the other woman. "Babe," Penelope turns her attention to Luke. "Will you help me bring more beer in from the garage. Excuse us," she tells the small group before turning to walk away while gripping Luke's hand in her own. She searches the garage as the door closes before turning to Luke and stating, "It's her..." she whispers.

"What?"

"Don't ask me to explain it, because I'm not sure that I can, but it's her," Penelope tells him again. Reaching behind her she unties the apron and hands it to him. "I've got some cyber stalking to do, will you cover for me?" He nods as she enters the house again and makes her way up the front steps to the second story of the home. When Penelope looks back down at him he's shaking his head and grinning up at her. Before she can think twice she blows him a kiss and quickly walks down the hallway.

* * *

 

"Okay, so get this," Penelope announces as she approaches the couch. She had wasted no time after the people had left their home that afternoon before she was furiously cleaning in her heels, and Luke found it incredibly sexy. But she batted his hands away from her each time he tried to distract her, even though the only thing she wanted was to get lost in the feeling of his hands touching her body. Her shorts slide up her legs as she climbs over him and settles onto the couch cushions. She can feel his hands reach out to steady her as she does. "Stephanie is only twenty-eight years old and she's been married three times, Luke, three. I can't get married once and she's ensnared three pour souls who have all turned up dead within two years of marrying her."

"So that would make her victim pool men, Garcia, not women..." Luke mutters as he takes the folder from her hands and props it open on her legs. He lets his left hand settle just below her knee, his right thumb tracing back and forth on her skin and distracting her from the task at hand. Penelope takes a deep breath before continuing with her explanation.

"So her husband John Taylor died last year while she was on a _trip_ with some friends and she came back to play the grieving widow, right?" Luke nods to show that he's following along with her words. "So that all went to plan, now in each of the previous neighborhoods she's lived in, she's found her husband in that same neighborhood. Usually the men are single, but John was married before to a Susan. So, I checked up on Susan and what do you know, Luke...Susan is also dead."

"How," he rushes the words out as he flips the pages she had printed out a few moments ago. "The MO is different from how our victims are being killed, Garcia." Penelope sucks her teeth and pulls a current case file off of the coffee table and opens it on her lap. She takes her time pointing out the similarities she had found in each case before leaning back into the throw pillows with a dramatic sigh.

Closing her eyes she mutters, "Is the MO different, Luke, or has she just evolved?"


	8. Chapter 8

_August 25, 2018_

_Luke stares down at his phone with wide eyes as the video plays again. The attachment was accompanied with the sentence: 'Do not react, I can see you." His heart is beating rapidly in his chest as he watches a slender hand slap Penelope across the face. There's an anger radiating through his bones as he moves quickly through the throngs of people cascaded around the covered deck of their neighbor's house. "Sorry," he mutters after he bumps into Sean on his way out of the yard. Once he's back out into the fading sun of an otherwise uneventful Saturday Luke finds that his legs are carrying him faster than they ever have before as he rushes to their home. Luke takes the steps of their porch two at a time and stops short as he notices the front door hanging open. He can see Roxy laying on the couch, a sad look in her eyes and he commands her to stay put when she notices him. "Luke, what's happening?" Shaking his head he sticks his hand out to stop Sean from entering the house and turns to the man while pulling his phone to his ear. "Prentiss, it's Alvez," he sighs and rubs his eyes with his free hand. It's not until much later that he realizes his voice was shaking as he spoke. "Penelope is missing." He turns away from the wreck that their living room was currently in and sits down on the front steps as he disconnects the call. He rests his forearms on his knees and hangs his head. "Alvez," Sean begins. "I thought your last name was Reyes?" Chuckling darkly, Luke turns to the man before speaking, "There's a lot you don't know. Why don't you sit down while we wait for my team to get here."_

* * *

 

August 11, 2018

"It's three in the morning," Luke grumbles as he rolls over and tosses his arm around Penelope's waist. Her fingers were still racing across the keyboard of her laptop and he can hear the printer in the next room continuously operating. "Are you ever going to fall asleep."

"Probably not today," Penelope mutters as she readjusts herself. "I want to have all of this information ready to give to Emily when she comes by later on today." She huffs in frustration when Luke's hand reaches up to push down on the screen of her laptop. Penelope lays her hands flat on the keys, careful not to press any buttons, as he uses his other hand to slide the computer off of her lap.

"We can get the file together before she comes over," he yawns. Rolling her eyes, Penelope slides down into the bed and lets his arms wrap around her waist. She shivers when his warm hand slides underneath the thin t-shirt she had tossed on earlier in the evening as she crawled into bed. He lets his smallest finger slide against the waistband of her panties as he buries his face into the crook of her neck. "There's something else I can think of to do right now."

"You just told me I had to go to sleep," Penelope replies. She sucks in a deep breath as his fingers dips under the waistband and inch lower.

"Yeah," he shrugs and places a kiss to her shoulder. "But now I'm awake so let's do something that will make us both tired."

"Okay," she moans as his fingers dip lower, sliding slowly across her clitoris before dipping lower and curling into her. "The file can wait."

* * *

 

Emily looks up from the file that she had been reading and glances between her two agents. They were sat on the couch together, Luke's arm tossed casually around Penelope's shoulder with a file being shared between the two of them. Shaking her head at the sight, Emily begins, "Okay, so you believe you met the UnSub the other day? At your party?"

"Yes," Penelope nods her head quickly. "We're not sure who her next victim is going to be, but I am going to call her and invite her out to do something. I haven't figured it out yet, but I'll figure it out." She waves her hand in front of her face to dismiss the question that her boss was sure to ask. "She dressed very uh..." Penelope moves her hands to move rapidly in front of her body and shrugs. "So, maybe shopping."

"We can figure that out later," Emily rolls her eyes. "What else did you find out about her." Penelope darts her eyes to Luke and then back to Emily.

"It's unconfirmed but it looks as if she had been having an affair with Sean," she mutters quickly. "The neighbor from across the street. His wife, Debbie was the one to tell me about Stephanie in the first place. There is recurring credit card transactions from both of them in the area surrounding the Motel out near the highway."

"Had been?" Penelope nods again and flips the pages of the case file and points halfway down the page.

"The transactions stopped in the beginning of last month, about a week before our first victim turned up," she says sadly. Emily notices immediately the way Luke's hand clenches around her shoulder and pulls her closer into his embrace. She lets her eyes narrow slightly and asks herself if she made the right choice in putting the two of them together. At the time she wanted to make sure that Luke had access to Garcia and her technical abilities throughout the month, but now she wasn't sure what was happening between them. A week ago it had seemed like they were getting along better, pretending well for the sets of eyes that could have been on them, but now. Here...in the confined space of their shared home with the blinds drawn shut, there was no reason for them to be huddled on the couch together.

"What's going on here," Emily finally asks as she crosses her legs and places the file on the table in front of her. "Between the two of you." She picks up her water and sips slowly as she watches them both tense. Notices that Penelope's eyes dart to Luke's face and her chest begins to move quicker than before she asked the question. The blonde woman was now clearly uncomfortable and begins to untangle herself from her co-worker. Luke, Emily notices, doesn't remove his hand or react to her question in any way.

"Nothing," Penelope mutters as she ducks her head and reaches out to place their file onto the table with Emily's. "We just find that it's easier if we stay in character."

"I'm sure I don't need to remind you that we're on an active case," Emily continues. "But if what you're saying about this Stephanie is true, then you all need to be careful. Understood?" She nods once to punctuate her sentence before standing and slipping the files in her bag. "Check in tomorrow."

* * *

 

"She knows," Penelope whispers harshly as she stabs at her salad. Luke chuckles as he takes a bite from his cheeseburger across the table and shakes his head.

"She doesn't know." Penelope looks up and glares at the man. "I mean for all intents and purposes, we," he points between them. "Are married. We're supposed to act like that."

"With people who don't know us, Luke," Penelope sighs. "But we sat huddled on that couch together, discussed a case while I was practically sitting in your lap. She. Knows."

"And so what if she does know?" He shrugs his shoulders and smirks over the top of his beer at her.

"We could lose our jobs," Penelope begins as she holds up her index finger. "One or both of us could be transferred, we could make a mistake and let the UnSub get away, we could ruin the dynamics of the team, we could betray Emily's trust in us, we could..."

"Okay, I get it," he tells her while holding up his hands. His eyes darken before he continues, "Do you want to cool things down?" Penelope immediately begins to shake her head and the fear that blossomed in his chest dissipates. It's replaced with a cool sense of relief, because the man isn't sure that he could ever go back to not having her.

"No, that's not what I want at all." She sits back in her chair and tosses the fork into her salad with a miserable grin. Penelope runs her hand along the top of her head before she looks up at the man sitting across from her. "Everything about this relationship is wrong according to the rules but it just feels right. And I know we could get in trouble, believe me I've been in enough trouble with the FBI in my life, but you're worth it to me. So I'm confused."

"So what do you want," he asks as the fear of losing her begins to creep back into his chest at her words.

She waves her right hand around her as she holds her head in her left hand and whispers, "this, I want all of this, with you. And that scares me."

"So, when we get back let's have this." He mimics her hand motions to try and get her to look at him but she doesn't. "Or we can have it now, your choice." He stands from the table and deposits his plate in the sink before grabbing the keys off of the counter. Luke is halfway to the front door before he calls over his shoulder. "Bring your East Coast purse and get in the truck."


	9. Chapter 9

_August 25, 2018_

_Luke sits with his head in his hands and his elbows pressing painfully into the tops of his thighs but he ignores all of that for the pain radiating through his chest. Currently, it is taking everything in his power to not go door to door with his gun and credentials and find her but that was the Fugitive Hunter in him, the Profiler recognizes the need to have a plan in order to ensure her safety. He can barely make out the words that were being uttered to him from the man seated next to him on the front steps. Luke realizes now that Sean's voice is irritating and once Penelope was safely back in his arms he would be happy if he never heard the wheeze again. A squeal of tires stopping suddenly pulls Luke's attention to the curb outside of their home and his ears immediately tune into the sound of sirens moving closer. He tries to stand but finds that his legs aren't working the way that they are supposed to and for the first time in the past year the man feels as if everything had spiraled out of control. It was his one job to keep her safe and he couldn't even do that properly. If there was one thing Luke knew, in this very moment, it was that he didn't deserve her...not one bit. "Talk to me, Luke," Emily shouts the second the door opens. And he finds that he has everything on the tip of his tongue, ready to relay all of the details to his boss and team so that they can find Penelope and the person who took her...but when he looks back up at the expectant eyes of his team all Luke can do is sob._

* * *

August 17, 2018

It was almost a full week before Penelope had gathered the courage to talk to her boss again. She had been dodging calls, begging Luke to tell the woman that she was in the bathroom, pretending to be napping on the couch, or engrossed in a conversation with someone in the neighborhood during checkins to avoid lying to one of her closest friends. But it was in the early morning hours of the seventeenth of August when Penelope climbed off of Luke and landed on her back with a heaving chest before her phone rang loudly into the still morning. So distracted was she, from the thrumming of satisfaction coursing through her body, that she blindly reached out to grasp the phone and bring it to her ear.

"Garcia," she says breathlessly as she tries to coax her body back into a normal rhythm. It wasn't until she heard the giggling that her blood began to run cold in her veins.

"That's not staying in character now is it, PG," Emily's voice laughs down the line. "You've been avoiding me."

Shaking her head and lifting herself up on her elbows, Penelope looks over at Luke who was running his fingers through her hair and trying to pull her closer to him. She shifts in the bed, letting her right leg drape over his bare waist before turning her attention back to the phone call. "I've been busy," she finally mutters. "Trying to befriend Stephanie."

"Right." Came another voice that Penelope immediately recognizes at JJ and rolls her eyes as she adjusts her neck in order to let Luke's lips land on her bare shoulder. She rolls her eyes at the man and tries to move away from him but he tightens his grip and pulls her closer to him. "We called around one and it went to voicemail, I suppose you were trying to befriend her then too?" Penelope huffs out a large breath of air and relaxes against Luke's chest. She balances her phone on her cheek and lets her right hand dance across the plane of his stomach.

"No," she whispers harshly. "I was sleeping. That's what normal people do at one in the morning." Her voice cuts through the line and makes the other women laugh loudly. It's then that she realizes there is a third voice that she also recognizes. "Hi Tara," she mutters miserably.

"Hi Garcia," she answers in mirth. "Now when you say sleeping do you actually mean sleeping or do you mean...sleeping?"

"Are we adults or..." Penelope lets the question dangle from her tongue as Luke moves swiftly and covers her body with his own. She shakes her head at the man, begging him with her eyes to stop whatever he was doing. She quickly pulls the phone from her face and presses the mute button before glaring at him. "Do not, Luke, do not."

"Do not what," he taunts before she can hear her name being called through the phone.

"Yes, my lovelies," Penelope says as she maintains eye contact with the man kissing his way down her body. "What can I do for you at," she checks the time, "four in the morning."

"Well you can tell us what's going on with you and Luke for starters," Emily rushes out. "The truth this time." Penelope rolls her eyes and sighs again as she reaches down to run her fingers through Luke's thick hair. She tugs at the strands and smirks when he growls and nips at the skin of her stomach.

"There's nothing going on between us," Penelope tells her boss quickly. "We're doing our jobs and learning to tolerate each other." His lips attach themselves to her right hip, pressing sloppy kisses across her skin. She bites down on her lip as he begins to suck at the area he had just kissed and Penelope realizes that he was leaving more marks on her body. To an outsider, should they ever see the skin underneath her clothing, they would assume that she was being abused. But as he drags his tongue from one hip to the other, leaving smaller marks as he goes, she finds it harder to contain the moan stuck in the back of her throat.

"I'm not blind, Penelope," Emily mutters and from her tone of voice, Penelope can tell that she is smiling. "None of us are. We know about the kiss at O'Keefe's."

"Derek," Penelope mutters darkly and hisses when Luke bites down after she muttered another man's name. She glares down at him and swats at the back of his head. "Okay, so we kissed. What's the big deal?"

"Do you have feelings for each other," Emily asks at the same time that JJ shouts, "What does he look like without a shirt on?" Penelope pulls the phone back from her ear to stare at it in horror as they continue asking questions and before she can formulate a single answer Luke has continued kissing down her body. All thoughts leave her mind as his fingers dip into her slowly and she finds herself shouting a hurried goodbye and turning off her phone.

* * *

August 18, 2018

Penelope glances over at the woman sitting across from her as she picks up her mimosa and sips from the delicate glass in the restaurant. Stephanie was clad scantily again today, and Penelope felt a bit out of her comfort zone in her sleeveless dress and wedge heels. The woman's long dark hair was pulled up from her neck in the most effortless way possible and once again, the hair was held back from her face with a pair of large sunglasses. Her teeth, Penelope found, were immaculate. White and pressed together in two neat rows. She didn't look harmless, but the technical analyst also knew that appearances weren't always what they seemed. Penelope decides to tune back into the conversation with the person she had been spending a lot of time with.

"So that's when I met Sean, and let me tell you for a married man, he was the most gorgeous person I had ever seen. I wasn't ever expecting to feel that way about another person after my John passed away tragically, but here I was coveting another woman's husband and I found that I didn't care, you know." Stephanie pauses to take a bit out of her avocado toast before continuing on with the conversation. "But your husband, well...you're a lucky girl aren't you?" Penelope blushes and nods before quickly taking another sip of her mimosa. The conversation was recording and she didn't want to let anything slip that could be misconstrued for another late night phone call between her and the other women on the team. "Tell me what does he look like without his shirt on?"

Penelope blinks rapidly and has to wonder why that seemed to be the topic of conversation lately. She could recall completely the way his stomach rippled underneath his clothes, could probably pick him out of a lineup blindfolded, and her tongue could expertly trace the ridges after only eighteen days. She shakes her head and blushes before answering, "It's a sight to be seen. And if I'm being honest, I won't ever want to give him up." She focuses her eyes on her breakfast and misses the dark look that passed over Stephanie's face.

"I wouldn't want to give him up if I were you either," the other woman mutters and when Penelope looks back up at her, Stephanie is smiling widely and lifting her drink into the air. "To a beautiful new friendship to a beautiful new friend."

Penelope can't help but shudder as she clinks her glass against Stephanie's and not for the first time this month, she wonders if she is in over her head.


	10. Chapter 10

_August 25, 2018_

_  
“Luke, I need you to let the officer’s through so they can begin processing the scene,” Emily tells him softly as she places her hand on his shoulder. He tenses under her touch and jumps to his feet and begins pacing the patch of lawn that runs along their walkway. Running his fingers through his hair, Luke turns to the rest of his team and lets out a shuddering breath before launching into an explanation. “So I got this when I was at the neighbor’s cookout.” He digs his phone out of his pocket and unlocks the device before pulling up the video and pressing play. He tosses the phone at Matt who catches it. “Whoever our UnSub is has Penelope and I let it happen because I let her walk home by herself.” He begins pacing again, his heart pounding erratically in his chest. The blood coursing through his veins feels sluggish and in this moment: the Ranger, the Fugitive Hunter, the Profiler, is sure that he finally found something that scared him beyond what he could have ever imagined. “We have to find her,” he whispers pitifully while looking at the faces of the people who have slowly become his family over the past years. “We’ll find her, Luke,” Tara reassures the man before climbing the steps into the house. His entire life for the last month was spread around the home and their team was about to discover how close he and Penelope had gotten over the past month. Luke moves his hand to the necklace dangling from his neck and places his palm over the circle dangling against his chest. With a silent promise to find her, and to find her alive, he follows his team into the house stopping to tell Sean that he should go home._

* * *

 

* * *

  
August 20, 2018

  
“So I’m inviting Stephanie over for dinner tonight,” Penelope shouts as she walks down the hall to the kitchen while holding her laptop in front of her face. She looks up quickly to make sure that she isn’t walking into anything before resuming her typing with her right hand. “I hope you didn’t have anything planned.” 

“Nothing planned, I think Sean wanted to come over to watch the preseason game that’s happening tonight, but that doesn’t start until eight or so.” She glances up to find him cooking shirtless in the kitchen again and takes a moment to appreciate the muscles of his back. He glances over his shoulder and smiles widely at her before continuing, “but I can tell him that I have other plans.” 

Penelope shakes her head as she watches the way his hair falls into his face in soft unruly curls this early in the morning. She remembers vividly pulling at them the night before, both of them being unable to actually sleep without falling into the other. The woman was starting to wonder if they would ever be able to keep their hands off of each other. That thought always leads to how she ever kept her hands off of him for as long as she did. 

“Earth to Garcia,” Luke calls out and Penelope blinks rapidly, her eyesight coming back into focus as she pushes her glasses further up her nose. “Welcome back.” 

Rolling her eyes Penelope slides her laptop onto the kitchen counter and hops into one of the chairs while sticking her tongue out at him. She had her hair pulled off of her neck, and Luke’s eyes darkened as a few tendrils brushed against her bare shoulders. Penelope shakes her head and holds up her hand, “No Luke, I’m sore,” she tells him with a glare. “You’re insatiable.” 

“You didn’t seem to mind last night,” he tells her with a smug grin. Penelope blushes bright red and ducks her head, turning her attention back to her computer screen. “What’re you looking at?”

“Stephanie’s online activity.” She pulls her bottom lip into her mouth with her tongue and presses her teeth down pinning it in place. The brief sting from the force of her teeth giving her mind something else to focus on rather than the shirtless man before her. She could have given into his lustful gaze and let him take her on the counter like he had during dinner last night, but she was confused at the websites that Stephanie was using. “It looks like she’s trying to learn Spanish, but I don’t understand why, nobody in the neighborhood speaks Spanish.” Luke shrugs and places a plate of food in front of her before leaning over and dropping a kiss to her forehead.

  
“Eat,” he commands. His fingers close the screen of her laptop over her typing hands. “We can come back to this but you need your strength.” Penelope rolls her eyes again as she removes her hands from the laptop keys and lets him snap it closed. Picking up her fork the woman takes a large bite of the food placed in front of her. “That’s better.”

  
“You’re so condescending sometimes you know that?” She continues chewing as he places a bottle of water in front of her. Smiling as she takes a sip, “what are you cooking tonight?”

  
“You’re cooking for her,” Luke tells her with a chuckle. Penelope chokes on the sip of water and brings her hand up to her mouth to catch any liquid that may spill out of her mouth.

  
“I’d kill her with my cooking!” Penelope looks at him with wide eyes and a quick shake of her head.

  
“Problem solved then, right?” He reaches out for his phone and slides his thumb across the screen before placing it between his cheek and shoulder. “Yeah,” he grunts.

  
“Neanderthal.” Luke glares over at her with a wide grin before placing the call on speaker.

  
“Guys, there’s been another body discovered,” Emily says with a heavy sigh. “Medical Examiner puts the time of death during Penelope’s breakfast date with Stephanie the other day, there’s no way that the woman can be in two places at once can there?” Penelope shakes her head as she finishes chewing her food.

“No, we went shopping after we ate, that woman spends more money than I can.”

  
“How long were you two together,” Emily asks. Penelope imagines the dark haired woman rubbing at her temples.

  
“About five hours, but I think that’s lowballing it a bit. It could have been longer.”

  
“I hate this case,” Emily mutters. “I e-mailed the case file. Look it over and let’s start again from the beginning.” She disconnects the call and Penelope is left staring at the phone in confusion.

  
“It doesn’t make sense, Luke,” she mutters. “We’re missing something.”

* * *

* * *

  
  
Penelope turns to Luke and nods, letting him know that she was going to leave the room and it was his turn to continue to scope out the woman. He had wanted to cancel the dinner after the phone call with Emily, but Penelope persisted, telling him that something wasn’t sitting right with her. She had exclaimed that she knew she wasn’t an actual profiler but that she had been around enough in her life to know when she should listen to something she was feeling. Luke sighs and rolls his eyes before walking back into the dining room with a smile.

  
“Sorry, Penelope had to run upstairs for something,” he apologizes when he’s face to face with Stephanie again.

  
“No worries,” she replies before approaching him. “It gives me time to get to know you better.” Luke lifts an eyebrow as she leans her right hip against the wall next to where he was standing. He stiffens as her hand lands on his forearm and is genuinely confused as she bats her eyes at him. “In fact, I’ve been learning Spanish so that I can talk to you in both languages.”

  
“That’s ambitious,” Luke tells her. He steps back and walks around to the other side of the table to begin collecting the dishes left over from their dinner, hoping that if he busied himself she would take the hint that he wasn’t interested. “But I don’t speak Spanish, I never learned,” he lies.

  
“Oh, I thought I heard you speaking it the other day.” Luke shakes his head as he carries the dishes into the next room and tosses them in the sink. He stiffens slightly when he turns around and finds her standing behind him. The man looks down at her with a disapproving gaze before trying to side step her.

  
“Excuse me,” he finally states, annoyance lacing his voice.

  
“We could be good together,” Stephanie purrs as she places her hand on his chest, her fingers tapping at the pendant laying against his skin. “I could show you a great time.”

  
“Not interested,” he tells her and backs up against the sink. “But thank you for the offer it’s very flattering.” Luke’s eyes scan the kitchen and finds that he’s trapped, the only way out of the situation would be through her and he’s sure that Penelope would be upset with him if he pushed the woman out of his way. He closes his eyes and rubs at them, the lack of sleep finally settling into his bones. He freezes as her lips land on his, Luke’s hands reach out to grip her by her arms and roughly pushes her back from his chest. “I’m happily married to the love of my life,” he tells her harshly. “Don’t ever do that again.”

  
“You can’t be happy with that when you can have this,” she tells him with an eye roll.

  
“Trust me, I’ve had girls like you before, vapid and vain, shallow and full of self loathing with daddy issues that won’t ever be solved. You’re broken and you use sex as a tool to manipulate everyone around you. You’re the type of girl to suck people in, trap them as you drain the life out of them, and then you let them go when you’ve taken everything you can from them. You’re a disease, Stephanie, and I’d rather not get caught in your Venus fly trap. So hear me when I say that I don’t want you, I have never wanted you, and I will never want you.” He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes. “Now leave before my wife gets back because anything I say will be nothing compared to what she will say to you.”

  
“Are you serious? You’re seriously turning me down for her?” She looks at him with wide eyes, her mouth dropping open and her eyes hard as she stares at him.

  
“Yes,” he growls. “Now get the fuck out.”


End file.
